How P90X gave me my life back

It seems that P90X is still mostly considered a weight loss program by many. Before and after stories still get the most attention if you can see a huge drop in weight. I am honestly a bit annoyed about that fact. It reduces an amazing fitness program to the bare bones. Of course the weight loss is really important to a lot of people and I can understand that but on the other hand it really does sell the program short.
I myself was quite thin to start with but I admire everyone who does lose a big amount of weight with P90X. I am not sure if I had the willpower to push through if I didn’t have a certain amount of fitness to start with.

I am coming however from a different background. One which you don’t really hear about that much because you can’t really show it in before and after progress pictures:

Besides the fact that I am toning down, I mostly love P90X because it taught me a new lifestyle and gave me a huge boost in overall living quality. My knee pain I used to have during other workouts has been going back steadily to the point where I don’t have to worry about it any more. I am positive that this is mostly due to the Yoga workout and the fact that it does work on the muscles I normally don’t use. Funny enough, I always knew that not eating breakfast is a bad thing..a lot of things I DID know but I never really saw the difference it makes if you START doing all those things and the positive changes that come with it. It taught and showed me why you should do all those things you hear about but maybe never really decide to start doing.

It gave me control over my body back. Something I was seriously missing after my first Multiple Sclerosis Attack three years ago. Since then I have been in the hospital 4 times, had huge troubles with my balance and chronically felt tired and without energy. I constantly felt cold, overwhelmed, stressed and like I had cotton in my brain. Not to mention every move felt sluggish and delayed to me.

During these 90 days I have learned why Yoga is important, what resistance training does, the different type of muscles and fiber types, why drinking enough water is essential, how you eat healthy, that people get educated wrongly by reading magazines that tell you, you can lose your saddle-bags with specific exercises only (right..), why both cardio and strength training are important, how your body works during exercises and after and why sleep is indeed very important. That you shouldn’t freak out when you gain a bit of size as a girl when you first start out to exercise and how to properly work with my hyper-extended legs. Lots of additional things you hear daily but it just does make so much more sense if you actually experience it yourself. It’s just sad that despite my athletic background with competitive sports at younger age, it took me almost 35 years to realize and believe in all this knowledge. All this due to the program itself and the communication with people on these boards.

Since I started P90X I improved from being able to do 2 normal push-ups to 20 normal ones. I went from 0 pull-ups to 3 unassisted ones, I went from 0 seconds of crane to 20+ seconds, I went from not being able to put my fingertips to the floor during standing hamstring stretches to almost completely contracted, from not being able to touch my toes during seated hamstring stretches to needing a yoga block for additional range. From not being able to go through one whole set of moves in ARX to being able to do the whole routine with only a few pauses here and there.

More importantly, I went from being scared to walk down the stairs to not having to worry about it. From being overly tired and unmotivated to very energetic and adventurous to the point where everyone around me gets exhausted before I even consider stopping. From not being able to properly paint, back to accepting freelance commissions again. Or in short, I went from being a MS patient with several impairments that seriously hindered my day to day life to feeling the best I have ever felt before – including any time before my diagnosis.

I went for several runs recently while enjoying some vacation at my parents place including a 10km run I didn’t even know if I can make it through. I did, without problems and I went running out of my own initiative which never EVER happened before. Just thinking back to that makes me water up because I never thought I would feel that feeling of being in control over my body ever again.

My before and after pictures will never look as amazing as some others but people around me, friends and family can clearly see the progress I made and the changes I went through. That’s all that counts for me. (Except my tummy – I love my tummy definition and hope to further improve with my current Insanity journey )

22 Comments

Spot August 14, 2010

Tascha I know that your story will inspire many people as it has me. P90X is NOT easy and it takes a very committed and organised person to stick with it and push as much as they can every time they work out. And it’s also a time-intense program which can be an issue for workaholics 😉

But you did it. And you finished it. And you also motivated others around you to do something about their levels of fitness too. And that can only be a good thing.

Most people with some form of health condition would probably have never gone near something like P90X, but you’re an example that if you commit to doing the best you can about your body, and follow that up with a healthy diet, you can overcome some of the difficulties of the condition and that pretty much anything is possible. I intend to be the second example of that in my circle of friends.

Aww, Spot, thanks so much, that was wonderful to read!
I really hope that I can get some people to see for themselves how much the decision to do something healthy can change their lives. I would also love for other MS patients to try it. Even though a lot of doctors would probably tell them the opposite. In the end everyone has to decide for him or herself it they want to try.

As much as I was not able to tell if I can run those 10kms I wasn’t able to tell if P90X was way too hard for me or not. But I tried and it was not!

Your story is truly inspirational. I was so disheartened to hear about you no longer being able to do your art (due to the fact you had contracted MS). To hear how you have taken control of your life, instead of letting it take control over you… this is something I am trying to accomplish.

I am trying right now to take control of my life, and the biggest part of that is my body, and getting into shape, and losing weight. Knowing what you have gone through gives me hope that I can fight my issues and get there too.

I truly believe that if you decide to tackle something and stick with that decision that everyone can achieve their goals. The important part is to really stick with your decision no matter what.

There was a guy with an artificial leg in the hardest P90X workout. I thought to myself, if he can do it there is no excuse for me to not try as well.

There are also a lot of very inspiration stories on the main beachbody.com website. Even if you don’t plan on ever buying any of their programs, the stories are amazing and where the main reason for me to decide I can do something like changing my life too.
Important is that it’s you making the decision because you want to and not because you think others expect it from you.

OMGoodness Tascha, I can’t believe that I found this blog! I am a 35 year old female who was FINALLY diagnosed two years ago with Lupus. For two years I struggled with doctors trying to find the right “recipe” of meds to assist me with pain and inflamatory control so that I may live my life. I was plagued with extreme fatigue and debilitating flare ups and just 4 months ago (well, about that) I too found P90x and it changed my life! I am currently on a rest period but plan on starting round two in October and I am also planning on following round two with Insanity…

Anyway, all that to say that you are an inspiration! Thanks for being so honest in your blog and I am a follower now 😉

Marjorie, thanks so much for your comment and for sharing. I am super happy to find a similar case with great results too 🙂

It would be great if you let me know how Insanity goes for you. It’s one tough program but I always feel great afterwards. I do have to be careful not to overdo it though. No matter how great it makes me feel.

Hey Tasha! I found your blog through Henning’s and I saw your story about P90X. It seems in life that certain things keep making themselves apparent the more interested you become in them. I’m starting week 5 of P90X tomorrow and I seem to hear success stories and other great stories about it all the time!

I won’t lie, I’m in it for the getting in shape/ losing a bit of weight aspect. I’m 25 and while naturally leaner, I’ve never been in shape my whole life. Going up 2 flights of stairs makes me winded. I can’t run for more than 20 seconds at a time. Stuff like that. I figured I let myself chill out and be a couch potato (or chair/computer potato) for 25 years, time to get motivated and cut the bad habits.

I wanted something I could do everyday (or close to it) and incorporate it into my lifestyle. I wanted this to be a lifestyle change, not just a quick fix. I find exercising first thing in the morning to be what works best for me. I think something like P90X isn’t asking too much of anyone. If you think about it, it’s only asking for 60-90 minutes a day. Out of 24 hours, that’s not so bad. I bet on average, people spend 1-2 hours a day just staring off into space (ok, maybe not consecutively)!

I’m a little discouraged with my results so far, but I have to remember I’m only a month into it and the big results will probably start happening closer to day 90. Your story and others like it keep me inspired to keep going. I’ve been wondering what people do after P90X lately. I just thought about continuing it, but maybe I’ll have to check out Insanity.

Char, I’ll drop you an email later today or tomorrow. I am on the official forums answering questions and helping others with motivation, tips and encouragement pretty much daily.

How closely did you follow the nutrition guide and how much calories are you shooting for? The biggest problem a lot of girls who want to lose weight have, is that they are undereating. Also, for us girls it takes longer to drop weight. It wasn’t until the end of month 2 that I really did see changes. One month is definitely not enough – some girls even have to go to 120 days to properly see results. Also, when you speak of results are you only talking about the weight number on your scale or other aspects too?

I tried to follow the nutrition guide pretty closely at first, but it’s a bit cost prohibitive to follow it exactly in my industry (a non-famous full time illustrator). I’m trying to not buy every individual ingredient, instead just trying to focus on the main ingredients (like if it’s a burger, maybe I’d skip the garnishes and just make sure I get the burger meat). In all honesty, I don’t feel I need as much variation that they have in the guide. I’d rather buy in bulk and just eat pretty much the same types of things every day (for one week, I did that- plain omelette or eggs in the morning, ham and cheese sandwich for lunch and sometimes also for dinner). I don’t get bored too easily with food, as long as the ingredients are fresh and good.

I’m following Level 1, but a lot of times I can’t physically eat the amount of food it tells you to prepare. I have to put it away for leftovers and with the way the meal plan works, I’m not supposed to eat it again ’til the next week, so a little wasteful. I’ve tried to tone down the amount of food to more “individual size” proportions.

I try to only weigh myself once a week, since I know that’s not the most accurate measurement of progress. Usually I just use my stomach as a guide as to how I’m doing. I just don’t feel it looks any different than when I started. I think I may take the pictures again (I couldn’t take good ones before I started), and it’d pretty much reflect what I looked like from the beginning. Like you said though, I shouldn’t be disappointed as it takes a while, especially since I started at 0% fitness at the beginning- ha!

The main reasons for not seeing the results people hope for are always the same:

Not properly sticking to the nutrition

Not allowing themselve enough rest

Skipping workouts

When it comes to getting used to the P90X Nutrition plan I had troubles too. Specially those huge amounts of omelettes (at least it seemed huge at the time) really were a pain. Not to mention I never really ate breakfast before that and it was hard to break that habit. Even though it’s not ideal balance wise I also like to eat the same foods for convenience reasons. I love my breakfast porridge too much to give it up 😉

Even though people don’t want to hear it but the diet IS the most important part of a life change when it comes to your body. Specially if you are like me and were in a really bad eating habit rut, under-eating which might be the case for you too, the higher calorie intake is needed to kick-start your metabolism. Just try to eat as much as you can of the suggested intake. You need to get out of your bodies current comfort zone which it probably set back to because of low food intake. I would assume that if you are like me and the average girl when it comes to work and how we eat, your system and the burn rate is currently slowed down which will hinder your progress with P90X. It’s a bit of a vicous circle: You need more Energy to be able to properly push the workouts but in turn you need to eat more. Eventually your system will change,most people will burn more calories (due to more muscle mass and due to a higher metabolism rate), which then leads to a better workout routine and so on.

When it comes to the scale, forget about it. Unless you have a scale that measures fat% and muscle mass too. Even then, those numbers should only be used to measure changes and not to actually take the numbers as gospel. Water %, Muscle Mass – there is so much that comes into the equation when it comes to the number on the scale that it’s not worth stressing about it – specially not that early during the program. If you aren’t drinking enough your body will hold into the water for example (same is true if you don’t be careful with salt intake). Specially the first phase of P90X is designed to get rid of water and teach you how far you can go without carbs before feeling too tired. The retained water will show on the scale AND in your body. Not to mention that your muscle will retain an additional amount and start swelling slightly because of the resistance training (which is completely normal).

At the beginning I found that buying protein powder and peanut butter helped easy me into eating differently. Even though the powder might be expensive it is easy to do a fast breakfast and drink a vanilla shake in the morning (or even bring it to work for a shake in between). Same for peanut butter. Bring it to work with some whole wheat toast and you have a nice snack. Or an apple.
Are you trying to do the whole 5 times-little-meal per day?

Also, like mentioned, it takes longer for girls to see results. We have naturally more fat tissue and also can’t go as low as our male counterparts when it comes to overall fat% (which is a good thing ;)).

Thanks again for the inspiration and info! I’ll try harder this month to stay to schedule on my nutrition guide and I’ve been working a lot harder on my workouts. I think I was slacking off at first by telling myself, “I can’t finish this tape” because I was starting off at such a low fitness level.

Excuses no more! 😉 Bring it!

Lu September 6, 2010

Wow, you look amazing! So healthy. I was googling yoga pictures and saw yours and thought “whoah, look at her face, she looks so awesome, what is she doing?” Then, I read about your MS. Wow.

Great write up. The stories of people who were not over weight don’t get as much hype as the weight loss stories but they should. Many people who are over weight lose the weight because they change what they eat. Seeing in shape people get even more in shape is what makes P90X impressive. I’m addicted to P90X. Its been 3 years since I’ve been to the gym.

I admire everyone who goes through an extreme workout program to lose weight and from an advertising point of view it’s the most lucrative thing to use but I agree: I really wish there was a bit more focus on other aspects of programs too 🙂

great story – and really helpful comments! i think your results look great!

my boyfriend and i completed p90x about two months ago. i was just looking to improve performance, as i’m fairly fit, so i really didn’t change my diet. it was my boyfriend who was in it to lose some poundage. i was pretty pleased with my physical state at the end of the 3 months, especially since i didn’t really change the way i ate – ironically, i saw better visible results than he did.

then i started a new job that’s very consuming, life got in the way, etc. so, i’m about to start it up again (my four pack is disappearing and that is just sad), and just had a few questions:

i’ve always been more into exercising that requires moving. maybe it’s working out in my living room everyday, but sometimes i need to get out! my bf also felt like he had all this muscle underneath that residual layer of fat, and if there was more cardio perhaps it would help. i was wondering if you felt the same way. do you incorporate/substitute running or other cardio activities into the p90x schedule?

i saw that you mentioned you can run a 10k now. i started running a bit towards the end of my p90x journey, and found no discernible difference in my endurance abilities. i was really quite faithful to the workouts, even when on a two week vacation. running endurance is one thing that i really would like to improve this second time around. any tips?

i also am concerned i won’t have time to do the ‘traditional’ p90x track. have you done the ‘lean’ version – if so, how were your results? do you have any advice for sticking with p90x on a busy schedule? i assume i will just have to be much more organized with my time – any help with that realm (whether it be motivational thoughts, time management, eating schedules…etc)?

I think it’s very cool that you and your boyfriend did a P90X cycle together.
I did feel the same way, specially with my legs which are my weak point still. That is the reason I am doing a round of Insanity currently (almost done as a matter of fact, I just started my last week yesterday). Well it’s not the only reason I decided to switch to a round of Insanity. I was also looking to generally improve my Cardio Vascular Endurance. I was tempted to switch to doubles in my third month of Insanity but went back to the classic because I was bonking and obviously not ready for additional workouts the same day.

About the running, I am not sure where it came from but I suspect it was the nutrition and the fact that it overall balanced out my vitamin intake. Keep in mind that I was also in much worse shape after all my hospital stays and having to take medication and generally very declined health and strength. Still, even before when I was very active I never felt that relaxed and comfortable running, nor could I have run that far. Another suspicion I have is that the stretching and Yoga did make my chest area more flexible which in turn made it easier for me to breath deeper. I used to breath shallow and fast before my first round of P90X. The improvements were very obvious at the end of Yoga where at the beginning I couldn’t do a fraction of the deep breath-ins and outs the gang did. In the end I was close to Tony in terms of how long I could breath out.

Insanity again increased that and my chest feels much more open now. I haven’t had the chance to run since I started Insanity (since I don’t want to risk getting hit by a crazy greek driver while trying to get some running done here in Athens ;)). I can’t wait to find time and a place to see how much I have improved cardio wise though. I realized now during Insanity that when you are at a low lower body fat percentage it seems to be easier to lean out with strength training. Cardio didn’t really do that much for me now when it comes to tackle those last fat storages in my thighs. Cardio is great when it comes to burning fat but once you are low in weight and body fat it’s more about turning those tissues into lean muscles and not really burning it off. You also can’t eat at a deficit anymore if you are already quite fit. Sorry got a bit off track here. It does however increase your VO2 Max, which means you can go longer without feeling the burn and your body gets more efficient in using oxygen to fuel your muscles, which is probably what you are looking for endurance wise.

I haven’t done the lean version. I believe that the strength you gain with the classic version is far more beneficial then the cardio.
As far as sticking to the schedule goes, I hear you. The time commitment is quite demanding. Another reason Insanity was a nice breather. It’s less time consuming. What really did help me is plan ahead and pre-cook meals. I use to cook on Sunday and then on Thursday again. Instead of just preparing one meal for the day I prepare more (i.e. whole wheat pasta, chicken, omelett, veggies etc) and store them in tupper ware in the fridge. The next day I can just get the things I need out and warm them up together. Frozen food also helps (such as frozen peas and corn nibblets). You can even prepare the actual potions and keep them in the fridge then warm them in the microwave (if you have one, we, unfortunately, don’t).

Workout wise: You can split up resistance days and do ARX either in the morning or evening, just make sure you warm up properly if you don’t do it all in one go. When it comes to the Yoga day, you can try to use Fountain of Youth from Beachbody which is the same type of Yoga but shorter (or so I am told). I am going to switch the PlyoX and KenpoX routines with Insanity workouts from the first month (which are shorter but more intense). That’ll save a bit of time as well while not losing any of the intensity.

I’ll try to think of some more tips I could give you. I have to admit though, I am surprised you got great results while not sticking to the nutrition plan – nutrition is about 80% of the success generally 🙂

thanks so much for your suggestions – i’ll definitely try to implement them!

i just started up with p90x round 2 yesterday, and i’m pretty darn sore…ha. i’m sticking with classic version again, so we’ll see how it goes. Insanity does sound intriguing – maybe i’ll try that out next!

as for the results i got from round 1, I lead a decently healthy lifestyle as it is (good food throughout the day, dogwalking, active schedule), so adding an intense workout basically everyday of the week was bound to make a difference in my appearance and ability. in addition, my body has always been one to respond pretty quickly in terms of muscle tone and weight loss. i’m also only 24, which probably helps quite a lot!

I was diagnosed with MS in October of 2009. I am determined to not let it beat me. I started working out a lot last year and am looking to up my workout routine. I thought of p90x but wasn’t sure I would be able to handle it. After reading your story, I’m sure that I can!

I know this post was a long time ago but I stumbled upon it! I was searching for fitness info for ms patients. I have been dx’d 10 years ago. I started Jillian Michaels body revolution in may. I was doing great ! Then halfway through it I had an ms attack which has left me numb from my waist down. I’m sure it’ll take time to return. I was mad because one day I was doing one minute burpee intervals and the next I can barely walk . So thank you now I’m inspired to start over and push through numbness and all . Again thank you for your inspiration !